While consumer applications in the Internet of Things get plenty of attention, revenues from the industrial and enterprise side of the IoT are expected to double the consumer market by 2020. Peter Bowen, a partner with Bain's Technology practice, outlines three important concepts that will help companies compete in the industrial IoT. Read the Bain brief: Choosing the Right Platform for the Industrial IoT

By Peter Bowen, Asit Goel, Michael Schallehn and Michael Schertler Connected consumer devices have captured the attention of the media, but the market for the Internet of Things (IoT) in enterprise and industrial sectors is poised be much larger—around $300 billion annually by 2020 compared to half that for consumer technology, according to research by Bain & Company. Industrial applications for the Internet of Things may not be as visible in most people’s daily lives, but they are typically more complex than those in the consumer realm. Many industrial applications operate large physical devices, and failure carries greater risk. Consider robotic arms in an automotive factory or valves in an oil refinery. The technology operates in real-time and it cannot simply stop operating without serious [...]

Connected consumer devices and wearables have captured the attention of the media, but the biggest battlegrounds in the Internet of Things (IoT) will be the enterprise and industrial sectors. Consumer applications will generate $150 billion by 2020, but business-to-business (B2B) applications will be worth twice that amount, with more than $300 billion in anticipated revenues. Globally, enthusiasm for the Internet of Things has fueled more than $80 billion in merger and acquisition (M&A) investments by major vendors and more than $30 billion in venture capital, according to Bain’s estimates. Within the industrial and enterprise markets, however, decisions about where and how to invest in IoT applications are complicated by fragmentation in industry subsectors and the mission-critical requirements of the technology. Some of the largest industrial [...]

By Darren Jackson and Herbert Blum If you’re like most Americans, you probably upgrade your phone to a new one every two and a half years or so. Maybe it’s not quite as simple as flicking on a light switch, but telecommunications companies have fine-tuned this transaction into a fairly mundane ritual. But that’s just your phone, circa 2017. What about a biotech company that needs to transfer the data of connected lab systems while securing sensitive or proprietary information? Or a car factory that needs to upgrade hundreds of sensor-equipped robots while minimizing costly downtime? Or a hospital that needs to protect patient data as it updates monitoring equipment? Just as no one thinks about the electric company until the power goes out, early exuberance for [...]

As the Internet of Things matures in its scope, Europe appears to lead the US in testing and deploying the new technology. Christopher Schorling, a partner in Bain's Technology practice, shares why Europe's focus on quality and security in a complex regulatory environment may be an advantage in the future. Read the related Bain Brief: Finding Europe's Edge in the Internet of Things

By Hans Joachim Heider, Michael Schallehn, Christoph Schlegel and Klaus Stricker Look around in traffic at the number of other drivers focused on their phones, and you begin to understand why so many are ready to let autonomous vehicles take control. But although many drivers can’t wait to release the wheel, there’s just one major hitch: Most aren’t willing to pay for it. That’s the finding of recent research from Bain & Company: Buyers weren’t willing to spend much more on advanced autonomous features (like fully automated highway driving) than they spend today on basic ones like adaptive cruise control or rear-view cameras. This disconnect presents a real challenge for automakers and their top suppliers, because today cars with the technology to drive themselves while [...]

By Michael Schallehn, Michael Schertler and Christopher Schorling American companies get plenty of attention for their forays into the Internet of Things, and with good reason: These are household names and megabrands wading into a fast-growing market that’s potentially worth $470 billion a year. But when it comes to actually embracing and implementing the technology, it’s European firms that are off to an early and commanding lead. It’s not just that corporations like Siemens and Schneider have invested serious money—more than €8 billion apiece—in IoT-related acquisitions. Our survey of 500 global executives shows Europeans are more ambitious and optimistic about their plans to deploy IoT solutions in the next few years. In fact, 27% of European executives we spoke to said they’re already implementing IoT [...]